BACKGROUND There are three species of elephant that exist, the Asian elephant (Elephas maximus) and two species of African elephant (Loxodonta africana and Loxodonta cyclotis). The populations of all three species are dwindling, and are under threat due to factors, such as habitat destruction and ivory hunting. The species differ in many respects, including in their morphology and response to d...

Burfi is a popular khoa based confection and its contains considerable amount of milk solids. The manufacture of value added products by using vegetable like elephant foot yam. The present investigation shows that, the overall acceptability of the elephant foot yam pulp burfi prepared with 10 percent elephant foot yam pulp in treatment T2 (23.65 )was highest and superior. Treatment T2 was more ...

Owing to their phylogenetic position, cartilaginous fishes (sharks, rays, skates, and chimaeras) provide a critical reference for our understanding of vertebrate genome evolution. The relatively small genome of the elephant shark, Callorhinchus milii, a chimaera, makes it an attractive model cartilaginous fish genome for whole-genome sequencing and comparative analysis. Here, the authors descri...

Human-elephant conflict (HEC) threatens the survival of endangered Asian elephants (Elephas maximus). Translocating "problem-elephants" is an important HEC mitigation and elephant conservation strategy across elephant range, with hundreds translocated annually. In the first comprehensive assessment of elephant translocation, we monitored 16 translocations in Sri Lanka with GPS collars. All tran...

Global climate change is predicted to bring longer dry seasons and changing rainfall patterns to equatorial Africa, causing range reductions for species such as elephants, whose diets are constrained by water availability. Elephants are facultative grazers whose diets are seasonal, with woody proportion of diet increasing in the dry season. In this study, we sought to identify the factors that ...

We developed an interferon-γ release assay (IGRA) specific for Asian elephants (Elephas maximus). Whole blood collected from forty captive Asian elephants was stimulated with three different mitogens i.e., phytohemagglutinin (PHA), pokweed mitogen (PWM) and phorbol myristate aceteate/ionomycin (PMA/I). A sandwich ELISA that was able to recognize the recombinant elephant interferon-γ (rEIFN-γ) a...

To better understand how elephant seals (Mirounga angustirostris) use negative buoyancy to reduce energy metabolism and prolong dive duration, we modelled the energetic cost of transit and deep foraging dives in an elephant seal. A numerical integration technique was used to model the effects of swim speed, descent and ascent angles, and modes of locomotion (i.e. stroking and gliding) on diving...

Dwarfing a Giant: Allometry and Ontogeny of Elephant Limb Bones Victoria L. Herridge, and John R. Hutchinson; Department of Biology, University College London, Gower Street, London, WC1E 6BT, UK ([email protected]), Structure and Motion Laboratory, Department of Veterinary Basic Sciences, The Royal Veterinary College, University of London, Hatfield, Hertfordshire, AL9 7TA, UK Elephants are t...

OBJECTIVES The elephant trunk technique for aortic dissection is useful for reducing false lumen pressure; however, a folded vascular prosthesis inside the aorta can cause haemolysis. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether an elephant trunk in a small-calibre lumen can cause haemolysis. METHODS Inpatient and outpatient records were retrospectively reviewed. RESULTS Two cases o...

Poaching has devastated forest elephant populations (Loxodonta cyclotis), and their habitat is dramatically changing. The long-term effects of poaching and other anthropogenic threats have been well studied in savannah elephants (Loxodonta africana), but the impacts of these changes for Central Africa's forest elephants have not been discussed. We examined potential repercussions of these threa...